


With Strings Attached

by Fluffifullness



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Dark, Durarara!! Kink Meme, Humiliation, Hypnotism, Izuo - Freeform, M/M, Mind Control, Porn With Plot, Sexual Abuse, Smut, Wordcount: 10.000-30.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-27
Updated: 2013-04-01
Packaged: 2017-12-03 20:17:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 8
Words: 19,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/702225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fluffifullness/pseuds/Fluffifullness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Why insist on an attack dog when you could train a bitch?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Probably the most smut I've ever written - or, well, it'll get that way with every update after this one. I wrote (am writing) this as a fill for a request on the Durarara!! kink meme on Live Journal, where it will be posted anonymously. (Save for the first post. Oops!) 
> 
> Warning: anon wanted humiliation and dark stuff, so that's what I will be aiming for.

“Hypnosis?”

Shizuo’s leaning casually against a dented park bench, palm pressed flat against the cold, rain-slicked metal. His question – appropriately skeptical and irritably delivered – is directed at an exceptionally jovial Kishitani Shinra. The doctor’s just found his friend at the tail ends of one of his rage-fueled, tempestuous fits of violence; the bench by which the two are standing is one of only a few pieces of architecture within a good-sized radius that hasn’t been drawn into the explosion.

“Yeah. I know of a specialist you could try.”

“Shit doesn’t actually work, does it?” Shizuo exhales soundlessly and watches the cigarette smoke curl up into a cement-gray sky.

Shinra grins and gets that look in his eyes that always serves as a harbinger of long, wordy rants and strings of useless information. Sure enough – “True, it’s not widely accepted in the professional world of medicine, but I for one don’t entirely discount its potential to influence neural pathways – even those in the associative areas of the cerebral cortex. Of course, its effectiveness does vary from person to person, and some believe that genetic factors – ”

“Shinra,” Shizuo growls in warning, and the doctor sighs.

“Right. Should I give you the name? He doesn’t charge much.”

“Whatever,” the blonde mutters, brow furrowed in obvious agitation. Shinra seems to take this as a yes, anyway, because he draws a small notepad and chewed-up pencil from the pocket of his white lab coat, takes a moment to copy something down, and then tears out the slip of paper to hand to Shizuo.

“Tell him Kishitani-sensei recommended you, and he might even give you a discount,” Shinra says with a parting wave. He’s eager to return home to Celty, after all, and he’s also wary of the police’s impending arrival.

Shizuo reciprocates the gesture and is left standing in the rain, smoking morosely as he scrutinizes his friend’s hastily-offered note.

He’s thinking that, crazy as it seems, it might not be such a bad idea. Couldn’t hurt to try, at least.

~

It doesn’t _hurt,_ but it _is_ damn annoying. Shizuo starts regretting his decision to waste a valuable day off on something like this almost as soon as he climbs out of bed that morning. It’s not even that he’s convinced of the impossibility, either – he spends plenty of time around all sorts of crazy phenomena – hell, he’s sort of out-there himself – so he doesn’t find it hard to get past the initial disbelief. No, it’s probably something as simple as not wanting to admit that some old crone with a pocket watch is capable of helping him out of a gun-trigger temperament that he’s already spent years of his life trying to best.

Besides, he hates the condescending attitudes that people at these places tend to have – as if the fact that he struggles with anything they don’t have to worry about makes them somehow superior to him in every other way possible.

He arrives early and goes inside anyway, cursing to himself all the while about how it’s just the sort of sketchy place that the flea might choose to visit – it is, and it’s barely even in Ikebukuro. Hell, it’s damn close to Shinjuku, which just might have a little something to do with Shizuo’s discomfort.

“Heiwajima Shizuo-san,” a grouchy-looking middle aged woman calls him, her voice high-pitched and nasally and all the more grating given that he’s already pissed. He’s been sitting in the tiny waiting room for all of maybe ten minutes, and he’s the only one there, but the lady apparently still has to call him as if he’s just one of many. He’s not stupid, dammit. He can tell at a glance that this business is suffering from a chronic lack of customers. Come on – they couldn’t even afford to rent a place with sufficient room to move.

He bites back his irritation, though. It’s another cold, rainy day outside; the blonde’s not eager to make the trip back to his own run-down apartment on foot. He’s not desperate, he tells himself – he just doesn’t want to give up before he’s tried anything. He’s not into wasting time, and he’s already paid, anyway. Right.

So, he rises to his feet with an unenthusiastic grunt of acknowledgement and looks around for a door or hallway. There is one, and he meanders hesitantly toward it before the lady behind the desk sighs and deems him worthy of her help. “Through there, first door on your right. He should be ready for you about now.”

“Thanks,” the blonde mutters, and he doesn’t deny himself the right to at least roll his eyes.

He finds the doctor – assuming that that’s the proper term – sitting at a tragically cluttered writing desk in a smoke-filled office. The room is pitifully small, even by Shizuo’s standards, and there’s barely space amidst the mess of books and paraphernalia for the blonde to make his way to a cozy-looking recliner.

“Heiwajima Shizuo-kun, was it?” The man is indeed getting on in years – his hairline gray and receding, a cracked pair of reading glasses perched at the end of his sharp nose. He’s sitting down, hands clasped studiously in his lap, but Shizuo can tell regardless that his height must be pretty impressive. That, at least, he hadn’t pictured.

Shizuo hopes that his glare isn’t too pronounced as he nods affirmatively.

“Excellent. What can I do for you, Shizuo?” Apparently there’s no need for further use of honorifics.

“Shouldn’t you know already?” the blonde retorts impatiently, and the other smiles tolerantly.

“Of course. But you’ll need to say it yourself for this to work.”

Shizuo has to resist the urge to groan – and then to overturn that stupid desk and all the papers strewn across it. He does, if barely. “I need help controlling my strength. A total idiot that I happen to know suggested this as a solution… or something…” Damn – why does it always sound so ridiculous when he’s forced to put into words?

But the hypnotist doesn’t look amused. He only nods understandingly – sagaciously, even, but it’s verging on melodramatic – and then opens a desk drawer to his left.

A pocket watch. Of course.

“I imagine you know the drill?” he says cleverly, and Shizuo nods. “Good, then. That will make this considerably simpler, won’t it?  You don’t need to listen to the sound of my voice just yet” – _good_ , Shizuo thinks sarcastically, because he’s not enjoying it as it is – “but please try to focus on your internal feelings of anger. Your worries about your strength. Can you do that for me?”

Shizuo nods again, and he’s then instructed – despite having established already that he’s well-aware of the basic methods – to watch the timepiece as it begins its swaying motion.

It doesn’t work at first. He’s too aware of the man’s eyes on him, of the acrid burn of smoke that trumps even what he’s accustomed to, of the conflicting thoughts and emotions battling for his complete attention. That’s quite possibly the key, though; he can feel himself getting frustrated by the persistence of the man before him and by his own failure. He latches onto that, and only then does he let his gaze fall upon and then follow the trajectory of the clock.

It’s around then that his conscious perceptions stop like a silent train crash. He doesn’t know if he’s awake or asleep, doesn’t dream, and doesn’t know anything of the commands that he then receives with arms wide open. “You will never again use violence to hurt anyone around you, including yourself. You will use your strength only when the situation demands it – only when you have no other means of protecting yourself or others.”

The balding man repeats this mantra, sometimes altering the sentence structure or wording just slightly, and is inwardly amazed at the incredible thoroughness of his subject’s transfixion. He’s experienced and good at what he does, but he’s never seen the treatment work this well, even after multiple sessions – let alone on the first occasion.

He finishes at length, and still Shizuo remains empty – eyes open and unseeing, muscles lax, slumped in the recliner – even as a particularly dangerous character bursts triumphantly into the room and offers both men a cheery greeting.

That character – obligatory fur-lined jacket in its proper place and sable black hair in its usual state of stylish dishevelment – then takes a closer look at his nemesis and narrows his eyes concernedly. “Oh, dear. Have we already started?”

~

Well, it _is_ the sort of place that a flea might frequent. Shizuo isn’t awake then to appreciate the irony of that foresight, and he certainly won’t appreciate it later.

And he’ll be even less appreciative of the doctor’s willingness to surrender his patient to the informant – not, as far as the old man knows, an informant at all, but rather a fellow practitioner and a close friend of Heiwajima Shizuo’s. The raven’s explanation is succinct and probably made believable only by his incredible acting. Still, it’s enough to earn him a decent explanation of the treatment Shizuo has already undergone – namely, the suppression of his strength – as well as some time alone with the unresisting blonde.

The former doesn’t exactly please Izaya, and he heaves a disappointed sigh as the door clicks shut. “Should’ve come sooner, I suppose…”

He steps forward, then, and traces the curve of the blonde’s jaw with one graceful finger. He proceeds to slowly raise the other’s face so that their gazes met. But the chocolate eyes, half-lidded and lifeless, are devoid of emotion, of resistance. “Such a boring expression, Shizu-chan,” Izaya mutters angrily, and he continues, “What should I do with you, now, hm? Losing your fighting strength may be just as well for you, but it really throws a wrench in my own plans. Come on – don’t you feel even a _little_ sorry for me?”

Shizuo doesn’t, and he won’t, but Izaya isn’t looking for a response. Not from this living puppet.

Still – he’s a fine puppet, isn’t he? It’s a different view, an almost thrilling view, this one – Shizu-chan, as seen from above. Resistance is something Izaya can always expect to get from Shizuo, but this is a special treat indeed. Shizuo’s chest rising and falling at an easygoing tempo, his hair soft and touchable, his clothes today not the usual bartender uniform. The white button-down shirt is _almost_ the same, but there’s no vest today, and the garment is open just enough that Izaya can catch a glimpse of the soft pink of the other’s nipples beneath the loose fabric. His skin is obviously smooth, too, and his entire body seems to radiate warmth.

A thought.

An impulse, an improvisation, not carefully planned but absolutely more appealing than Izaya’s original intentions. Why insist on an attack dog when you could train a bitch?

“Shizu-chan,” Izaya whispers suddenly in the other’s ear. “When you wake up…”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shizuo wakes up all at once – eyes widening and breath quickening as if he’s just been slapped – and finds himself in a very different position from the one he should be in. And so it begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I _still_ don't know how to judge the quality of the smut I (try to) write, so do feel free to leave constructive criticisms or what have you. Still, it seemed like a pretty solid attempt. Yup.

Shizuo wakes up all at once – eyes widening and breath quickening as if he’s just been slapped – and finds himself in a very different position from the one he should be in. The old hypnotist is gone, replaced now by Orihara Izaya in all his smirking glory. The blonde isn’t sitting on any recliner, either; he’s lying on his back, and his shirt has mysteriously vanished. The room isn’t the same – not cramped, not clouded with smoke or stuffed with books. It’s a spacious bedroom, and he’s – Shizuo is – lying amidst a swath of white sheets on a large bed.

What catches his attention most, though, is the look on Izaya’s face – or, no, it’s probably just the fact that it’s Izaya there, gloating down at him as if he’s just accomplished something incredible. Izaya, and Shizuo half-naked and… oddly unable to bring himself to leap forward and strangle the flea then and there.

“A dream,” Shizuo decides aloud. It has to be, because this – this situation makes no damn sense, and this impossible rage can’t know hesitation. It – he – doesn’t know how to wait. If he’s hesitating, it’s because this is a dream, a nightmare. The one and only person around whom he doesn’t necessarily want to hold himself back is right here, and he _can’t_ act on that enveloping fury.

But no such luck. Izaya looks like he’s trying very hard not to bust out laughing. “Guess again,” he murmurs, and Shizuo stiffens as the informant leans forward to drag the tips of his fingers down the center of Shizuo’s chest.

It’s nothing. Nothing, but Shizuo’s breath catches in his throat and he’s suddenly very, very hot. His skin still tingles where Izaya’s fingers have barely brushed it, and beneath that tingling is a fire that shouldn’t, _should not_ be there. “Y-you were there? That appointment?” Shizuo whispers the next logical conclusion, and he sits up suddenly to drag himself backward, away from the man who remains in his place – cross-legged on the bed in front of Shizuo.

“Good answer,” Izaya praises the blonde, and Shizuo doesn’t miss the dangerous smile that precedes the next three syllables. “Shizu-chan.” Every sound carefully formed, pronounced like a spell and accompanied by tiny exhalations that sound as loud to Shizuo as the beating of his own heart.

He moans, loud and needy, his cock suddenly hard and his every muscle straining desperately for release. “F-fuck,” he gasps, and he can’t quite seem to draw enough air into his starving lungs. “What did you do?” And even he doesn’t miss the way the pitch of his voice spikes at the end of his sentence. It almost becomes another moan, but he bites his lower lip to hold it back.

“Oh, nothing,” Izaya says cheerfully as he creeps just a little closer to his nemesis. “Just a little hypnotism – that _was_ what you went to that man for, wasn’t it? Answer me.”

The words come spilling out of Shizuo’s mouth before he can even think to hold them back. “Shinra said he might be able to help – help me control my strength. He said he didn’t charge much, either, so I – ”

Izaya smirks and holds up a hand for an ever-more bewildered Shizuo to stop. He does, immediately, and in the next second he’s slapping Izaya’s hand away as the informant reaches for the zipper of his pants. “Wh-what the fuck is this?!” Shizuo growls, and Izaya sighs condescendingly.

“The good doctor did as you asked him to and locked that ridiculous violence away before I got there,” Izaya explains, amber eyes fixed on Shizuo’s lust-darkened brown ones. “So, I, having been thus prevented from making you an obedient little soldier for my own use, had to come up with something else to do with you. After all, it _was_ a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

“Yeah?” the blonde breathes, strenuously disinterested, eyes narrowed as he backs further away from the informant.

“Don’t fight me, Shizu-chan,” Izaya demands suddenly, and Shizuo obeys without meaning to, gasping wantingly as his nickname falls again from Izaya’s lips and pulling his hands back to his sides as the informant removes his pants and boxers together.

“I – I can’t…” Shizuo breathes, but Izaya isn’t having any of that. He takes Shizuo’s rock-hard erection in his hand and pumps it quickly a few times, his hand cold next to Shizuo’s incredible heat. The blonde’s panting heavily, now, and a line of saliva escapes from the corner of his slightly parted lips. He whimpers softly the moment Izaya’s touch disappears – he wants so desperately to resist, but he can’t and he rolls his hips slightly forward in the hopes that Izaya will add just a little more fuel to that fire. Just a little more, dammit, and then he can pretend that it wasn’t Izaya’s touch, Izaya’s voice that put him in this state.

“No speaking,” Izaya warns, and Shizuo’s voice is thoroughly gone just like that. His eyes are half-mast, his cock throbbing hungrily, his one arm lying limp on the pillows above his head while the other grips the bedcovers in a tight fist.

“Now,” Izaya says matter-of-factly, “spread your legs wide – that’s right, like that. You know, Shizu-chan?” Shizuo shivers pleasurably in response, and Izaya grins. “I’m usually not into talking through things like this, but I’ll make an exception for you today.” The blonde’s eyes are on him, pleading just as emphatically as his swollen cock – precum shining, dripping, at the head. “You know what your name does to you, I take it?”

 _That’s not my damn name,_ Shizuo desperately wants to snap. He wants to strangle the life out of this bastard, too, but mostly he wants to push him down and fuck him so hard he won’t know what hit him. His cock twinges almost painfully at the thought.

“And my touch, too,” Izaya says smugly. “Feels good, doesn’t it – Shizu-chan.”

Another shock of pleasure courses through the blonde’s ardent body, and his head snaps back with a resounding moan. His pulse flutters in his throat, and Izaya leans in to slip his tongue across the skin there. That, of course, only excites Shizuo further, and his eyes slip shut as every sense but pure and simple touch seems to fade into a dull roar of impassioned ecstasy.

He feels, with everything he has, Izaya’s hands on him, on his whole length. Pressure, slick and fast and sure. He’s on fire, powerless to do anything to extinguish _or_ fuel it himself, and he can’t do anything about _wanting_ Izaya, either. He can’t run, he can’t fight, but he can lie there, prone and needy, while the flea toys with him. While he presses his thumb into the head of his cock, moves it in a slight circular motion so that Shizuo can feel it all the way down the shaft, the rest of Izaya’s fingers curled around and _it fucking burns._ It burns and tingles so much and he’s never felt this good or hated the feeling so _much_.

Izaya knows. He thinks it’s funny, and he’s clearly savoring every moment of Shizuo’s ordeal. He drags it on for a long time – touching, all over, the blonde’s heated body until he’s fit to burst and _only then_ pulling back and letting his victim simmer down. It can only go on like that for so long, though, and eventually Shizuo finds the release he’s been craving; he comes, spraying white and actually sobbing because Izaya’s fucking told him to and because the sensations are just too much for his overtaxed mind.

He hates it. He hates the way Izaya laughs then, hates the informant’s obvious sense of entitlement. Hates that when he’s told to suck Izaya’s cock he can do nothing but comply. The informant’s hands tangle in his hair, but his smirk is still as smug as ever.

Shizuo does his damnedest, after all, to wipe that fucking smugness off of Izaya’s face, but he apparently doesn’t have it in him. Inadequate, as always, and now reduced to serving as this bastard’s personal cocksucker. He’s not even sure anymore where he should focus the brunt of his resentment, but it’s probably veering inward more than outward now.

“By the way,” Izaya murmurs as his cum fills Shizuo’s mouth and throat, damn near choking him. “I introduced Shinra to that hypnotist. And” – he runs his hands teasingly, now, through his enemy’s blonde hair – “I made sure that he’d find you the other day, with the subject still fresh in his mind. Not often that Shizu – oh, I’m sorry, that _you_ fall so neatly into my traps.”

Shizuo’s eyes widen incredulously, and he tries to pull away from Izaya; this time, he’s allowed to, and he sits back with his legs folded under him and his hair totally disheveled. He opens his mouth to speak but finds that he still can't, that he remains physically incapable of forming words. He closes it again, quickly, and drops his gaze to his hands in his lap. They’re shaking, trembling with rage just barely held in check.

How could he have been so stupid? And why? Why does Izaya want to do this? What has Shizuo done to deserve it? He isn’t a terrible person, is he, even if he does hurt people and scare them for no good reason? Even if he does lack self-control that doesn’t come from hypnosis or skills that would allow him to make it in life without relying on the kindness of people like Tom and Kasuka. Even if…

He blinks, surprised by the way his hands are suddenly blurry and sort of rippling before him. He reaches up, watched amusedly by Izaya, and finds his cheeks wet. He’s crying? Dammit, no, not in front of this flea, not now. He rubs at his eyes in an unsuccessful attempt to stop it, and suddenly Izaya’s hand is on his and pulling it back.

“Hold still,” Izaya demands, and he brings his face within a few centimeters of Shizuo’s.

He licks at the salty, hot liquid, and Shizuo shivers because Izaya’s hands on his waist, his tongue – all of it, that little burst of electricity inside of him, spreading across his sweat-dampened skin, and the warmth building again in his stomach. It feels good, and that’s just unspeakably wrong.

He’s already half-hard and breathing noticeably faster when Izaya withdraws and smirks once more – more amused than ever, now, more mocking. “On your hands and knees – now.”

It’s getting darker outside, and the clouds still have not left with their unfallen rain. They’re swollen and heavy, too, and Shizuo’s low moans mix with the patter of rain on the rooftop as the hours continue to advance through the night.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And when Izaya finally does come calling – days later, and every one of those hours a hell of paranoid apprehension, backward glances and vague explanations about the collar and his newfound pacifism – it’s hundreds of times worse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Goodness, this took forever to write... (Also, how the heck? This story already has infinitely more hits than anything else I've posted recently. Not that I don't like that, just. Huh. ;)

That smoky net of clouds continues to hover low over the city even as the sun finally rises sickly and pale to light them from behind. Shizuo’s lips are faintly red and noticeably swollen by then, though, and he is far beyond noticing anything as distant as the sky. Every new burst of throbbing pain in his lower back is a vivid reminder of the night’s activities. Every last sensation incarcerates him in his worn body, trains his total attention on the very physical, the beyond-his-control.

There isn’t a thought in his head, not anymore – there’s just no room for that, dammit – as he drags the back of his hand abstractedly across the band of leather that dangles loosely from his neck.

There, also, the broken crescents of teeth marks etched into his skin, and his fingers still sticky – sticky, and trembling just slightly with purely irrational emotion. He glances down at his feet to ensure that they’re still planted on solid ground, and then unsteadily raises one to take a step forward.

 A thrill of fear, because how can he do this? After hours and hours of nothing done by his own will, nothing but fingers igniting his skin and pulling his hair and his body nothing but a puppet with strings attached? His muscles still don’t feel right – all the way down to his bones, this feeling of control lost, never to return – and his foot hanging there makes him feel like he’s free-falling again.

One foot before the other, and the pavement is like a sharp diagonal line stretching interminably into the distance. Shizuo’s free, right now, but for how long? How long until Izaya comes calling again? This is how things will be, now – Shizuo trying to live his life and Izaya always ready and waiting to call on him.

It’s like he already can’t imagine making all of his own decisions. Or any of them – the decision to walk one way or another, to cry or to destroy – but, no, destruction is no longer a plausible means of releasing the crushing tension that is already building in him. Will he even be able to shout when he can’t take it anymore?

He wants help, wanted help – something, maybe – a goodbye, the tiniest reassurance or maybe a chance to shower, but all Izaya had to offer him when he finally lost interest was a simple command and an unabashed promise for more. Get out of the building – after that, you can just do whatever.

I’ll see you later, _Shizu-chan._

~

And when Izaya finally does come calling – days later, and every one of those hours a hell of paranoid apprehension, backward glances and vague explanations about the collar and his newfound pacifism – it’s hundreds of times worse.

The buzz of Ikebukuro living its tires-squealing, teenagers-laughing, feet-scraping-pavement and sun-beaming-down life is bad enough as it is. But it’s not just the time – no, it’s that Izaya follows Shizuo, catches him on break in a crowded area and calls him knowing damn well that the last thing the blonde wants is to be caught like that in the midst of the city that is supposed to serve as a haven for him.

But there it is, the cheery ‘Shizu-chan’ and the brick wall of lust that sends the blonde reeling, shocked and scared and running out of the restaurant where he’s supposed to be having lunch with Tom.

“What’s with him?” the debt collector wonders, addressing no one in particular. The surface of a half-finished glass of water – nothing else, because food has recently lost much of its appeal for Shizuo – shivers, ripples as little circular waves push outward from the center, stirred by the blonde’s sudden and violent departure.

Several cubes of ice shiver briefly in a state of delicate balance before clinking their way deeper into the silvery liquid. “Guess he has things to do,” the informant responds vaguely, and he slips out of an adjacent booth to give chase.

 

Shizuo isn’t quite as fast as Izaya, but he is nevertheless already out of sight by the time the informant enters the bustling street. No matter – he calls loudly for the blonde to wait, and it carries above the sounds of humans at work and play to reach Shizuo and stop him in his tracks.

Izaya chooses to search rather than to have the blonde come directly to him – more fun, that way, more suspense and anticipation. He finds Shizuo leaning wide-eyed against a brick wall, black pants visibly strangling his erection. His breath is coming in short gasps, and beads of sweat are beginning to accumulate on his brow. He does his best to infuse a touch of defiance into his glare, but all it really conveys is fear.

“Looking good, Shizu-chan,” Izaya murmurs as he kneels before his captive. He likes that look on Shizuo, likes the high-pitched moan that pierces the other’s façade as that hated nickname rolls off of Izaya’s tongue. “And eager, too.”

“Leave me alone,” Shizuo hisses, chocolate eyes darkening with another degree of arousal for every inch closer that Izaya’s hand comes to his crotch.

“Let’s see… How about telling me exactly what you _really_ want me to do?” The informant tugs the front of Shizuo’s pants open and slips has hand inside, his eyes glinting with unconcealed delight.

Shizuo’s own eyes slide shut, and the corner of his mouth turns up in a twisted sort of smile. “Kill me…”

There’s an honest surprise, now, and its underlying significance is enough to send a little shiver of pleasure up and down Izaya’s spine. Shizuo would really, truly, prefer dying over being touched like this by his hated enemy. It’s just too thrilling.

But he won’t let him off that easily. “And? What else?”

Shizuo blinks and then turns his face away from Izaya as the rest of his body responds with an enraptured jerk to the gentle pressure of Izaya’s hand on his cock – still bound, for the moment, by the thin cloth of his boxers. “That,” he breathes. The words hitch in his throat, but he’s no longer in control of them and they find their way out regardless. “I want you to do that.”

“Oh? Not that you want me to let you go?”

Shizuo’s eyes widen, but he isn’t seeing anything in front of him. “…No,” he responds, his head swimming. It’s okay. It’s okay. It’s just because he’s this far along, and Izaya’s still playing with him through his clothes. Of course his next most urgent desire would be that kind of release and not the kind that equals freedom.

Still, it scares him. Irrational, precipitate, overwhelming. He hates having to doubt the obvious almost as much as he hates people who try to conceal it. The rage that results – mortifyingly – only adds to the yearning, wanting throb beneath Izaya’s palm.

“In that case,” Izaya murmurs, his hand curling cool and adroit about the upper edge of Shizuo’s boxers and jerking them down just far enough to fully expose the blonde’s cock. “I suppose I’ll oblige you, if only because Shizu-chan is at least enjoying this physically.”

So he’s noticed. Of course he has – Izaya’s too damn observant not to be able to read Shizuo at such close quarters, and that holds especially true when the blonde’s every sensation is made obvious by responses that would have been beyond his control normally. When he’s sweating and his chest is heaving and he’s blushing like a fucking schoolgirl, trying not to let himself drown in the good feeling and still, still, _still_ finding himself leaning just slightly into Izaya as the informant pulls him into a deep kiss.

Tongue fighting tongue and lips pressed tight against each other, the two aren’t even slightly synchronized. It’s clumsy, messy – not a touch of finesse or tenderness. A different sort of battle from the old ones, the ones Shizuo knows will never come back. When they break away, even Izaya’s face is slightly flushed, and Shizuo isn’t so far gone yet that he misses the telltale bulge.

“And just where are you looking?” Izaya whispers seductively in the blonde’s ear. That voice, that breath gusting hot and ready across the nape of Shizuo’s neck – his thoughts grind again to a screeching halt, and he’s left to stare blankly back at the informant as he leans off of Shizuo and quickly undoes the clasp of his jeans.

“Actually, Shizu-chan, I have something special for you today,” Izaya adds as his and then Shizuo’s pants crumple to the dusty, oil-stained ground beside them. He digs around in his fur-lined jacket for that something and then waves it – them – triumphantly in his rival’s face.

Shizuo lets his eyes fall shut as he takes a single, shuddering breath to calm himself. He’s not at a loss for words – hell, no, and he’d really like to let the verbal abuse roll like marbles off his tongue right about now – but he sure as hell isn’t about to justify this with a single utterance. He’s still clinging to his pride, and also – also, damned if he doesn’t know that Izaya will only make this whole thing that much worse for him if he says anything.

As it turns out, Izaya’s perfectly capable of making things worse without Shizuo’s help. “ _Relax_ , Shizu-chan,” he commands, and he’s clearly making an effort to raise his voice loud enough that it _just might_ attract attention. Shizuo gasps, shudders, and, in that same moment, casts a panicked, side-long glance in the direction of the alley’s entrance.

That’s all he has time to do, though, because in the next instant his neck and limbs – his chest, his stomach, even his ass – everything loses the tension of being coiled about a trembling wire of arousal. He’s still treading the border between that and orgasm, and every ensuing touch of Izaya’s is still just as electrifying, but –

 – but just that one word from Izaya’s lips, used so effectively, has left him completely immobile.

“There – isn’t that better? You really should try not to tense up that quickly, you know.” Izaya’s lips, warm and soft against Shizuo’s earlobe, and then the sharp sting of teeth. “Or I might assume that you actually enjoy this.”

Shizuo whimpers his denial and averts his eyes, focuses them desperately on his hands – palms turned up, lying useless at his sides. Nothing happens. He stares at them, feels them and the bone and muscle and the scraping gravel beneath them, but they won’t move. So strong, and yet so powerless, and what he feels far more than his useless appendages is the one that Izaya chooses to touch, then, with his oh-so-capable hands.

“Look.” And Shizuo’s eyes respond immediately to the command, finding intuitively not the informant’s face but his slender fingers and the hollow cylindrical tube that he is in the process of slipping past the head of the blonde’s cock.

Shizuo makes a little sound in the back of his throat and has to blink back the tears that threaten at the corners of his eyes. “Sh-shouldn’t you’ve put… put that on before…” It’s a bit of a tight fit at this point, and Shizuo’s honestly not sure that he can handle being touched and squeezed all at once. Coming before Izaya wants him to might at first sound like a nice way to get back at the bastard, but he knows how the informant plans on playing this. The fun will last as long as it takes for Izaya to be satisfied.

“Ah, yes, about that. I gave it some thought and realized something – you don’t really need anything like a cock ring, do you, as long as you have me?”

Shizuo finds that he can at least shift his gaze a bit, and he does – finds Izaya’s face and narrows his eyes as a wave of almost-over-the-edge pleasure courses through him. “Hh… huh…” Broken syllables that escape his open mouth mingled with gasping, starving, shuddering breaths.

Izaya understands the question that Shizuo is unable to voice and answers it, as he is wont to do, with another order. “Don’t come until I give you explicit permission.” He leans a bit closer and adds, “Crying is allowed, though. Really, don’t hold back on my account.”

Shizuo’s chocolate eyes widen, and this time he lets the tears spill over. “Don’t,” he pleads. “P-please, don’t…”

He immediately hates himself for those three words, for giving in to the unabating temptation to beg. He’s just carved another small chunk out of the crumbling block of his pride and willingly handed it to Izaya. And the bastard knows that.

“Beg some more,” he promises, finishing his earlier job and then reaching for a glinting pair of handcuffs, “and I might let you come before you sustain any lasting damage.”

But Shizuo doesn’t beg – it’s not an order, after all, but more of Izaya’s mocking. So he resists, bites his lip and squeezes his eyes shut as the cold metal closes on his wrists, binding his useless arms behind his back. He tastes blood and tries not to think about Izaya inside of him, about Izaya hard and hot and heavy and filling him to the brink. He feels like he’s going to split in half. He can’t adjust, can’t breathe and can’t think through the pleasure-fueled insanity, so when Izaya doesn’t move, he gives in quickly and opens his eyes.

He’s on his back, dirt accumulating in his dyed-blonde hair and gravel digging into his skin through the fabric of his uniform. He should see the sky, and he does, but all he can focus on is Izaya smirking down at him from above.

“Enjoying the view, Shizu-chan?” And, not expecting a response, the informant simply continues, knife in hand, by slicing down the center of the blonde’s shirts, by pinching both of Shizuo’s nipples between thumb and forefinger and tweaking them from side to side to elicit a low moan from the blonde. “Just so we’re clear, I really do have all day, and I can sit here like this for a very long time without getting quite as impatient as Shizu-chan already is. So, you can let me know when you’re ready for me to move; I’ll just do little things like this until you feel like begging.”

“No,” Shizuo whispers hoarsely, and everything really is worse like this – people traversing the sidewalk mere meters away from the two men, a few stopping occasionally to notice them and then hurrying on with shocked disgust plain on their faces. The toys, the little bumps on the inside of the one stimulating all of Shizuo’s nerves even without Izaya having to do much of anything. Izaya penetrating him, unmoving but so fucking tempting there that Shizuo is about ready to just give in and grovel his way to an orgasm.

“Enjoying the audience?” Izaya guesses, then, and Shizuo blinks incredulously up at him. “Don’t look so surprised, Shizu-chan” – a bolt of pleasure, and Shizuo’s not sure for a moment if the guy above him is someone he knows or if what he’s saying is even in Japanese – “it’s your fault for being so easy to read.”

Izaya’s tongue has barely finished forming the last word when it finds Shizuo’s right nipple and swipes its way from there across to the left. He sucks on that one, lets tongue and teeth work together to draw a choked, half-sob, half-moan from Shizuo. “I think you’re honestly enjoying this, too,” he says appreciatively.

“M-move,” Shizuo gasps desperately in response, and Izaya raises his head to look Shizuo meet the blonde’s gaze directly. They’re mere centimeters apart, and in his enemy’s eyes the informant can see nothing but pure despair and lust.

Fine. That’s what Izaya’s been aiming for, after all. But if Shizuo intends to give in, he’ll have to deal with doing it according to Izaya’s rules.

“I’ll need a little more than that, Shizu-chan.”

“L-like what, you… b-bastard…” The words are slurred with emotion and arousal, and Shizuo’s not fooling anyone, himself included, with his weak attempts at the defiance he’s barely had from the first moment of their encounter.

That smug, self-satisfied smirk that Shizuo so wishes he could tear to shreds – “Like lies, Shizu-chan. You seem the sensitive type, so I’m sure you can come up with something.”

Sensitive? Lies? The only sensitive thing is his body, right now; his self-hatred, self-doubt, insecurity and suffocating rage – all of it, down to the most insignificant thought, has been reduced to the level of pure physical sensation. He feels humiliation and fury very literally with every throb of his cock, with every little shift of Izaya’s weight that forces him to focus his total attention on that incredible pressure, with the cold bite of metal and the twinging of his saliva-soaked nipples.

Lies. He can do that, he _will_ do that. Because he’s only as good as Izaya will let him be.

“I love this,” he gasps. “I need more, Izaya-sama, _please._ ”

“Tsk, tsk – Shizu-chan, even you should be able to tell how weak that is. Real begging. Now.”

Shizuo squeezes his eyes shut and struggles to find his voice in the midst of all that electricity, all that smoke and fire. “I – I’m nothing compared to you. I – I wish I had half the brains and I honestly think you’re probably the sexiest fucking person I’ve ever met, man or woman.”

“Comparing me to a woman? I don’t think so,” and to emphasize that slight displeasure, Izaya runs his hands roughly up and down Shizuo’s body; the blonde jerks reflexively in certain places – the sensitive skin at the edges of his balls, the place where his legs meet the rest of him and several spots on his chest and stomach. The informant makes due note of each for future reference. “And here I am going to all the trouble of finding your good spots…”

“I love you,” Shizuo sobs, but really it’s hate that’s exerting a strangle-hold on his throat. The words come out mangled, almost unrecognizable. “I’ll do anything.”

“Suggestions?”

“Costumes,” Shizuo breathes, and there’s no room for regret anymore. Just need, just lust. “M-more than just handcuffs and _oh God Izaya just end it!”_ He shouts it as loud as he can manage with not enough air, shouts and doesn’t care who hears. Izaya considers, painstakingly slowly, then shrugs and nods his consent.

He angles downward, then, just right – once more, and Shizuo shouts again a jumbled mess of incoherent syllables as Izaya’s cock finally finds that all-important sweet spot. He should be coming – hell, he’d have come so long ago, if only Izaya would just –

“Not yet,” the informant – dark-eyed, too, and face faintly flushed – says with a laugh. Shizuo moans long and low in response. He’s left to meet each thrust with one of his own – slow, steady, and each glancing blow a shockwave that disrupts every thought Shizuo has ever had, every memory and moral that he clings to. He wants so desperately to increase the pace, to find oblivion in the light at the end of the tunnel, but he’s powerless to do so.

Izaya does, though, and he does it more quickly as his own desires take control. “Permission granted,” he pants as the frenzy reaches its trembling peak, and still he’s smirking as he comes inside and as Shizuo comes white and shuddering and sticky beneath him.

 

The informant climbs steadily to his feet, then, tells Shizuo that he’s free to move and _looks like you’re still in over your head, ne~?_ He uses the blonde’s pants as a rag to clean himself up – the dust, mostly, but also the flecks of cum that haven’t managed to soak his enemy’s chest – then dons his own jeans and stands still, smirking down at the blonde.

He’s waiting for something, he supposes – maybe for Shizuo to break the handcuffs or to deny his earlier promises – his suggestions, which Izaya will certainly make use of next time. Shizuo will not be allowed to forget anything – not his words or the pleasure or the fact that he belongs to Izaya.

But the blonde doesn’t do anything, just lies there and slowly recovers – now on the brink of losing consciousness and coming back only by creeping degrees. Izaya has to satisfy himself with a few more astute observations – about the tears still stinging the blonde’s cheeks, the slowly receding shivers and his half-lidded eyes underscored by sunset-red. Shizuo takes it, lets his eyes flutter briefly shut as the informant caresses the side of his face, his neck, and marks once more with his teeth the ownership that he will soon exercise again.

“I’ll do you a little favor and let Tanaka Tom-san know where you are. Wouldn’t want you catching cold out here, and your poor uniform’s hardly in any shape to be worn around the rest of the day.” I’ll need you in good health for next time, but there aren’t any rules to say that I can’t let others know about the state you’re in.

On the contrary – that’s the most amusing course of action for Izaya to take now, and wouldn’t it just be downright selfish for him to keep the image of a sexed-up Shizu-chan all to himself?

“Izaya – wait, don’t…” But Shizuo doesn’t have all of his thoughts back in line yet, hasn’t regained enough control to even extend a hand after the informant’s retreating form.

More apprehension, then, because with this it won’t just be his problem. He’ll be making Tom-san worry, and worse than that is the knowledge that he will be judged for it, for falling into a trap like this and letting himself be carried along on a wave of purely physical desire. For not using his judgment, for not being on guard, and of course, _of course_ he won’t be able to ask for help. Selfishly, because he’s scared of this weakness, scared of confirming it by relying on others and also scared that his refusal will hurt Tom-san. That sticking to lies and weak explanations will destroy the trust he’s worked so hard to build.

But without those lies, what is he? Just a puppet, a doll – Izaya’s toy, his lover with strings attached.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And he will be, for as long as it takes to lull him into a false sense of security.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This isn't my favorite chapter (needs more smut?), but you have no idea how much I'm looking forward to writing the next few. Gonna be great~! (Also, thank you for all the hits, kudos, and so on. :O It's so incredibly gratifying! :)

Shizuo struggles. He wills his muscles to work, to move his heavy arms, to break the goddam rings of metal – still cold to the point of feeling damp against his taut skin – but he can’t do it. His stomach is churning and fluttering and burning – burning, also, are the back of his neck and his tear-streaked cheeks – and he wills it to stay calm. There’s not much there for him to throw up, of course, but the wave of nausea could easily knock him out of consciousness for as much time as it’ll take Tom –

“Shizuo…?”

The blonde curses softly, opens his eyes and wonders vaguely when he closed them. The debt collector is there at the front of the alley, his own eyes narrowed and gradually adjusting to the dimmer light. He takes a step forward and calls again, his tone still only casually confused because what it looks like shouldn’t be possible. Laughing at himself, probably, because it’s just ridiculous to think that Shizuo – Heiwajima Shizuo – could wind up in a state like that – must be some drunk, some prostitute with too great an appetite for troublesome customers. Another random victim of another random gang. A joke of Izaya’s.

But then it _is_ Shizuo, pale skin against a dark background of dirt and gravel, eyes wide and fixed on his sempai as if he has something to fear from him. “Tom-san,” he mumbles, and now he’s focusing his attention on the third, most overwhelming task of holding back tears. He knows from experience, now, that his eyelids will not stop the warm, salty liquid from escaping, so he doesn’t bother with letting them fall shut.

He waits for Tom to ask him the obvious questions, the what’s and the how’s, but that doesn’t happen. His sempai’s probably just a little too shocked, down on one knee with his hands poised uselessly above Shizuo – what-should-I-do etched into every part of his appearance.

Concern, too, and Shizuo sighs softly, feels his muscles tense up and finally manages to break the thin chain that binds his wrists together. “I’m okay,” he lies as he heaves his aching body into a sitting position, but his voice is strangled and his eyes are reflecting just a little more shimmery light than they should in this dark place.

Tom doesn’t say anything, just pointedly avoids looking at Shizuo’s lower half, at the other toy that yet remains in its place – until Shizuo finally removes it with a smooth motion, cringing as he does so because the wet noise it produces is hard to ignore. Tom’s brow furrows in what might even be disgust. Anger. Pity.

And Shizuo only wants to curl up in some dark corner. He wants to disappear. He wants to be gone from this place, freed of the obligation to speak to Tom now.

“You want, I can run and get some clothes for you,” the debt collector offers at length, and Shizuo – knees drawn to his chest and arms wrapped about himself to stop the trembling – swallows a sob.

“You don’t have to do that. It’s my fault, running off to – to do something like this.” He closes his eyes, then, and buries his face in his hands. “It won’t happen again, so can you – can we just pretend this didn’t…?”

“No,” Tom answers mildly. There is a beat of silence during which Shizuo has to cling ever more desperately to the shreds of his composure.

Then – “Look, Shizuo…” his sempai begins again. “I’m not going to ask you to tell me what you and Izaya were just up to. That’s your business, and if you don’t want to talk about it, you shouldn’t have to. But let me at least say this much – if he’s somehow forcing you into anything – ”

“He’s not!” Shizuo blurts, eyes going wide as the threatening tears once again get their way. “I just… made a mistake here. I don’t want to bother you with this, so” – he lurches forward, grabs at his ruined pants and forces a smile – “for now, this is fine, okay? I don’t mind working a little later to make up for the time, so give me a few minutes to find a change of clothes.”

The look on Tom’s face at that moment tells him everything he doesn’t want to know. He still trusts Shizuo, dammit, probably because his lies are so scripted, so pathetically transparent and he also knows that he’s not saying these things for his own sake. It’s unmistakable, now – the concern, yes, and the pity.

“I’ll be waiting back at the restaurant,” the older man sighs, and he has to force himself to leave Shizuo in that state. It’s not right, the look in his eyes and the state of his body, but he can’t force his kohai to accept help. He’s stubborn, good at convincing himself that lies are truth and that hiding pain will somehow make things better for everyone around him.

Never mind himself.

The blonde’s sad brown eyes follow this retreat and then fill with a million kinds of pain – unobserved, this time – as he does his best to fix his clothes up, to brush the dust from his hair and then to proceed nonchalantly into a dizzyingly bright streetful of people who don’t think twice about boring holes into him with their stares.

~

Days – weeks – later, and Shizuo is with Izaya again – with him again, crying again, all the agains that comprise these encounters. The sameness always flecked with new cruelties…

“That outfit really suits you, Shizu-chan,” Izaya purrs this time, lips curling up at the corners of his mouth in a suggestive smirk. Shizuo moans, low and unrestrained, as his nickname echoes in his ears, as the informant reaches around the blonde and slips a single, slender finger into his opening. He makes tiny circles, skirts the sensitive skin, lets the blonde really feel him going in deeper just a little at a time. Stirring him up, making sure that every inch of Shizuo is bathed in the electricity of his touch – inside and out.

The bunny ears perched atop the blonde’s head only add to the adorable despair that floods his expression right then. “M-more,” he pants, his cheeks flushed and the black silk of his skin-tight costume straining against his shuddering muscles. He can’t hold himself back now – _“Let your body take control this time,”_ the informant has commanded, and everything he feels is immediately action because of it.

“How much more, Shizu-chan?”

Shizuo shudders as the name again sends familiar ripples of pleasure pulsing through him, and he leans back into the informant – seated behind him, legs circling his waist and arms extended in front of him – seeking more of the informant, more contact and more of the detached warmth that characterizes every ounce of their closeness.

He doesn’t bother much with thought any more. Maybe emotion, but that, too, has become secondary. He is a body; the mind is gone, is somewhere far from him now and he – what’s left of him – is in love with this touch. It’s a little better than being a tool, a doll. Even if he still is – fuck, as long as he can _pretend_ otherwise, it’s okay. Less terrible, less painful for as long as he’s still following Izaya’s orders.

“All of you, everything,” Shizuo whimpers, his voice rising in pitch as Izaya slips another finger in alongside the first and expertly brushes the bundle of nerves with just the tip of one. Shizuo moans, jerks his hips forward now and pleads aloud for Izaya to keep going.

They’re together in Shizuo’s tiny apartment, together on his unmade bed. It’s probably well after midnight already, but Shizuo’s not sure; he can’t keep track of the hours that go by any more than he can keep track of the days or the weeks that may or may not have passed with him so often at Izaya’s mercy. The pointlessness is incredible; he goes about his day-to-day functions like a robot, converses with Tom and Celty but doesn’t enjoy a single damn moment of any of it. He’s always waiting.

And when he isn’t waiting, he’s serving his purpose – and consciously hating every second of it.

Still, hatred is like enthusiasm, which is like having a reason to live. Nothing else can give him that, anymore, so he clings to the moments he so despises just as desperately as he tries to avoid them. He lies about it, too, and he knows that he’s not fooling anyone. They know that he knows, and he does it anyway because he can’t be sure of the consequences of telling the truth.

Izaya’s up to three fingers, and Shizuo is gasping because he’s still not used to having this much inside of him, to this costume – plush tail positioned just above a conveniently-placed hole – or, indeed, to the pressure of Izaya’s erection against his back. Familiar, all of it, but always more than he fucking expects. “Feels good,” he pants, his tone full of innocent wonder and his eyes brimming over with tears – that’s a regular thing, too, and he’s just about stopped caring what the informant thinks of it. “Izaya, it feels good…”

Izaya doesn’t ask him if he’s ready, doesn’t offer any comment aside from a sigh that might even be one of boredom – just goes for broke, fills Shizuo to capacity and laughs like velvet as the other’s head snaps back and he gasps. The movement – connecting like a snake at all points – is a current, charged sunshine that drags itself like a claw up and down his body, onto his skin and up his throat to produce a desperate moan.

“You’re holding yourself back, aren’t you,” Izaya suggests, and he almost looks disappointed when the blonde nods mutely, eyes half-mast, sweat-soaked skin and hair sticking to his forehead as he trembles, half-limp, in Izaya’s arms.

“Want to… feel better with you,” Shizuo mumbles. He – his body – wants the pleasure prolonged. No need to care about how masochistic, how low he is like this – wrapped up in Izaya’s embrace and begging to be fucked a hundred different ways.

And it escalates all the time, this routine – Izaya, eyes burning with resentment and lust, pushing him further, making him come more and harder and by more and more creative means. In public, on camera, everything. The internet is filling with rumors, Izaya with boredom, and Shizuo with hopeless resignation.

And so Izaya’s training has just about paid off, but that simply means that the informant’s achieved his goal. He’s won his game, and Shizuo has thoroughly lost. Puppet. Doll. Bitch. It doesn’t matter what name he takes, because the end result is the same regardless.

Of course, Izaya should have anticipated that he would quickly lose interest without the spark of a challenge. Training is one thing, but ownership can only please the informant for so long. The shivering, sobbing, giving-in-to-orgasm, hands-clenching-in-sheets and voice-catching-in-throat monster beneath him is predictable. Every touch and every word with its proper response. Little deviation.

He’s not a human, so of course it won’t be quite enough to observe him suffering according to a set pattern. He has tricks up his sleeves, still, but Izaya’s more for dramatic cruelty.

Which is why he lets Shizuo swallow him down, then – tongue exploring warm, smooth skin and the weight of Izaya’s cock pressing into the blonde’s starving mouth – why he leans forward in the final moments and whispers two words that leave Shizuo stunned and confused and wonderfully, perfectly _hopeful._

“You’re free.”

And he will be, for as long as it takes to lull him into a false sense of security.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And Izaya disappears just like that. Not a word, not so much as a wave – just turns his back and the click of the door shutting is so quiet that Shizuo almost doesn’t hear it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's possibly apparent in this chapter that yours truly kind of really likes Tom/Shizuo as a largely-ignored ship. It's barely - if even - implied, though, so don't you worry if it's not your thing.

Izaya gives Shizuo plenty of time to ponder the implications of his statement. He moves slowly and silently about the blonde’s apartment – showers, takes his time getting dressed and then wanders from room to tiny room. He waits as long as he reasonably can before finally returning to stand by the blonde’s bed.

Shizuo’s still there, still recovering – breath rasping in his throat and muscles pulling weakly at motionless limbs. Izaya removes the collar from around his neck while those brown eyes – framed in a lovely, tear-stained red – search his face for a hint. There is none, of course, and Izaya disappears just like that. Not a word, not so much as a wave – just turns his back and the click of the door shutting is so quiet that Shizuo almost doesn’t hear it.

~

“You’ve lost weight, haven’t you?”

Shizuo nods noncommittally, his eyes fixed on the rain-drenched scene that hovers beyond the window of the small family restaurant in which he and Tom are sitting. “Guess I have,” he mutters, and he knows it’s a pretty cold response but he’s always been like that on the worst days. He figures he can get away with this just as well as he can get away with lying so obviously every other day of the week – couldn’t make these interactions more strained than they already are, anyway.

Tom sighs and sets his glass of water back down on the table without taking a sip. He leans forward, elbows dodging untouched plates of food to rest on the flat surface, and claps his hand to Shizuo’s shoulder. Shakes gently so that the blonde turns to look at him, and then does his best to look supportive. He’s not great at it, but he hopes that the thought will count enough to make up for that.

“Eat,” he insists, and Shizuo’s gaze drops to the plate of curry that his sempai just pressured him into ordering.

“Not hungry,” the blonde mumbles, and his attention flits immediately back to the sparsely-populated street.

“Shizuo,” Tom warns, and his grip on the younger man’s shoulder only tightens. “Eat.”

“Tom-san…” Shizuo pleads with his eyes. _Let me be._

He’s watching for Izaya, of course – three days, and not a sign. Three days, and he’d been coming so much more frequently for what had seemed like so long. It can only mean trouble, can only mean that at any moment – right, even now, that flash of black – no, just an office worker – but it could be – any quick, peripheral movement could be Izaya with a new trick, some new novelty and a few hours of recovery from that total control of his.

Because not even Shizuo is built to handle being so thoroughly dominated by any external force – emotionally, of course, but he’s physically limited, too. It takes longer every time for him to regain all of his normal mobility – that, like so much else, scares him, and he wonders sometimes if, one day, he won’t recover at all.

He feels the warmth of another body next to him, then, and the cushion of the booth upon which he is sitting dips under the added weight. Shizuo glances over at Tom – glasses off, for once – and the debt collector gives him a searching glance. “I’m sorry,” he says after a moment, and Shizuo doesn’t know what he means.

Tom must be able to tell that he’s confused the blonde, because he rubs at the bridge of his nose – fending off another headache, most likely – and then adds, “I shouldn’t have ignored this for as long as I have. I’ll be blunt – you look awful, Shizuo. Anyone could tell you’re seriously worried about something.”

“I’m – ”

“Okay, right?” The older man’s gaze has turned again to something both gentle and reprimanding. “I get it. You don’t want to talk about it. That’s fine, but what you’re doing now isn’t.”

Shizuo makes a fist and brings it down on the table – not hard enough to crack the smooth surface, of course, but the resulting crash draws the attention of several other diners. The impact sets their plates and silverware clattering noisily, and that unsteady pitch is what fills the silence between the two until Shizuo finally opens his mouth to speak. “Tom-san, I – thanks for worrying, but there’s – there’s no point.”

“To what, eating? Sorry, but we’re not going back to work until you clean your plate.”

Shizuo forces a smile. “You wouldn’t make a good mother, Tom-san.”

“I’m serious, Shizuo. You won’t last the rest of the day if you don’t get some food.”

The thought makes Shizuo’s stomach churn – the smell, the imagined taste and texture, all of it. “I can’t.”

“Are you sick?”

“Thought you weren’t gonna make me talk about this.”

“Then eat.”

It’s sort of great, really, that this guy can continue to care so much despite all the crap that Shizuo’s been making him put up with. He’s not giving up, not backing down just because his kohai is a stubborn moron who doesn’t know what’s good for him. It’s that, the blonde decides, that warrants at least a little effort on his part, so he sighs and lifts a small spoonful of food to his mouth.

He blinks, pauses for a moment with the utensil still held between his lips.

“It’s good…” Surprised, because he can’t remember the last time he used that word to describe a thing like this. It’s still warm, somehow, and the spices are mild enough that they don’t come as too great a shock to his taste buds. Thick, creamy, not at all spicy, and this is how he likes curry – or how used to like it, but it’s so just-right that he’s starting to remember how to enjoy this simple pleasure in the here and now.

He takes another bite, and another, and before he knows it there are tears slipping silently from the corners of his eyes – a heat in his stomach that doesn’t come from fingers dragged across his skin, a weightlessness he hasn’t felt in so long – hell, he doesn’t know if he’s ever felt it all, really, because it’s been that long and that hard.

“How is it this good?” he mumbles, and Tom matches his embarrassed grin with a smile of his own.

 _What am I going to do with you?_ That’s what that smile seems to say, but what actually comes out is, “See?” and, “I’ll buy you dinner, too.”

~

Another week passes – another, and a handful of days after that – and the paranoid hysteria finally starts to fade – slowly, of course, but steadily. Shizuo has Tom to thank for that – Celty, too, and it’s actually thanks to her suggestion that he’s finally able call Kasuka, to invite him for coffee late one Sunday afternoon.

They go to a nice place – a great many floors up and sporting a sweeping view of the concrete jungle that is Ikebukuro. Maybe a little out of Shizuo’s price range, normally, but he’s okay with this. It’s a special occasion, after all – he feels safe, today, and that’s special enough, but it’s also one of a precious few opportunities he’ll ever have to spend time with his little brother.

Shizuo’s actually not sure how he can face him now when he couldn’t before. He hasn’t really achieved anything, and he’s lost plenty. He’ll regain it, probably, but he’s still a failure in a lot of respects.

Still, he sort of feels – for now, at least – that Kasuka will accept him despite that. He’s not wrong.

A wave of light rolling off of the setting sun illuminates the tallest buildings, flashes along their blades of glass and glows orange on the walls of the little restaurant. It’s beautiful, Shizuo thinks, and he’s just a little proud of himself for noticing that. Beauty isn’t in a life of constant rape and fear. It’s in this – this place, these people, the sun and the press of warm air rushing forth from overhead heaters.

“I saw your new movie the other day,” he says as they both settle into a table beside one of the larger windows. “It was good.”

Kasuka nods his thanks, and that’s enough for Shizuo. His brother doesn’t speak and therefore doesn’t expect Shizuo to do so – it’s a nice break, sometimes, from the slight but constant pressures of how-are-you-today and have-you-been-eating-enough. He appreciates that, too, but there are times when all he really needs is the proximity.

Still, they do exchange a few words – old childhood memories, small talk that’s all the same as saying nothing at all – and Kasuka does seem to be checking on Shizuo. Quietly and in his own way – brief asides, quick questions and unobtrusively assessing looks – but the small concern is there.

Shizuo quells it – not because he has anything to hide, this time, but because he’s not sure that it’s needed any longer.

Kasuka’s drinking coffee, but Shizuo doesn’t actually prefer that bitter stuff. He’s ordered a shake, instead, and the cold sweetness sticks to the back of his throat, floats at the tip of his tongue and raises the tiny hairs on the back of his neck even as he joins Kasuka on the elevator down and then says his quick goodbyes.

That cold, tingling buzz doesn’t fade until later that night, but he thinks nothing of it. He’s not back to normal, but he _is_ inexplicably safe now. He doesn’t consider for a single moment that the hair-raising chill is anything close to instinct or an indication of danger lurking. It’s cold ice cream, sweet and extra large with a thick blue straw and sunshine at several stories up.

Which, Izaya decides – binoculars fixed attentively upon the blonde, smirk spreading wide and eager – must mean that it’s just about time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope that that was effective enough despite being only a very short alternative to lengthy descriptions! I didn't want to dwell too much on it, but it was significant to the plot. *still likes concrit*


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shizuo’s sitting on Shinra’s couch, brown eyes wide with disbelief and – oh, yes – fear, mouth set in a firm line, hands curling into fists at his sides. “Flea,” he spits – furious and nervous at once, but it’s clear that he doesn’t yet completely grasp the meaning behind Izaya’s presence there – arms crossed on his chest, gloating smirk and everything else about him just the same as if nothing’d ever changed. He doesn’t know what’s about to happen and that’s good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was really eager to write this chapter, so I went ahead and did so despite the fact that so little time has passed since the last one was posted.
> 
> And... Tom and Shizuo... I lied a tiny bit and took that relationship a little further here. (Haha...) *not sure whether or not to add a relationship tag* I mean, it's pretty much just a counterpoint to the Izuo, but still...

Shizuo may be ripe for the picking, but that doesn’t mean that Izaya can simply jump in all at once, tactless and oh-you-thought-I-was- _serious?_ It’ll take a little more than that to justify all the time he’s spent waiting through crushing boredom as his work undid itself. Hunger may be the best spice, but imagine how much better a meal might be with the addition of others – shock, for example, and fear. Horror.

Humiliation, too, but there are always ways to augment that flavor – creative ways, and surprisingly simple ones as well.

Izaya decides to go the simple route – less is more, in this case – and he doesn’t have to wait long for the perfect opportunity. His Shizuo – _his,_ still, and he can’t wait to make that painfully clear – has been relying on his friends quite a lot these days. He’s disgustingly close to them, now, in Izaya’s opinion, but that turns out to be a blessing in disguise.

Because Shinra and Celty invite the blonde and his (irritatingly chummy) boss over for dinner one night. The get-together isn’t intended as a proper celebration, but it will apparently have the atmosphere of one. Small, private, and unofficial, because none of them is entirely certain of what went on with Shizuo – hints and rumors aside, it’s understandably hard to imagine – but he’s obviously recovered from something awful and that’s enough.

Izaya can’t wait to see how they’ll all react to the main course.

~

Shizuo’s sitting on Shinra’s couch, brown eyes wide with disbelief and – oh, yes – fear, mouth set in a firm line, hands curling into fists at his sides. “Flea,” he spits – furious and nervous at once, but it’s clear that he doesn’t yet completely grasp the meaning behind Izaya’s presence there – arms crossed on his chest, gloating smirk and everything else about him just the same as if nothing’d ever changed. He doesn’t know what’s about to happen and that’s good – delicious, the security he seems to feel at the side of his friends and the change that Izaya can just _see_ in his mind’s eye, the expression he anticipates.

Shinra takes an uneasy step forward, hands raised as if he means to intervene in a fight. “Orihara-kun, what are you – ”

“ – doing here?” Izaya finishes for his friend. He smirks, drifts a bit closer to Shizuo and rests his hands on the back of the couch. Leans forward, holds Shizuo’s gaze with his own when the blonde turns just enough that he can see the informant. Moves in for a kiss, balancing on the couch and the tips of his toes, stretched long and straight from an entire cushion away.

Their lips can only brush briefly before Shizuo jerks away – flesh that was pale with shock just moments before now a bright and eager red, fists suddenly so tight that they threaten to split the taut skin which covers them. “Get out of here,” he demands, but he’s still feeling that touch and Izaya knows. His smirk intensifies, and Shizuo doesn’t stand because he doesn’t trust his legs to hold him steady.

How cute – still wants to maintain appearances in front of his little friends. But Izaya will put a stop to that forthrightly.

“As you can see, Shinra,” Izaya purrs, catlike eyes flitting from his prey up to his audience and then back, “I’m here for Shizu-chan.”

Shizuo’s breath catches briefly in his throat before again forcing its way past his very best defenses – dragging with it a horrified, hungry moan and he pulls his legs up to his chest in a desperate attempt to hide the bulge in his pants. It’s too late, though, and Shinra looks at him with an expression that Shizuo never wants to see again. He doesn’t know how to describe it, really, but he thinks it might be colored by something akin to curiosity. Concern, doubt, and probably a dawning sense of realization.

And Celty, standing frozen in shock right up until her shadows drag Izaya back several feet – slamming him to the floor, pinning his arms behind his back and the sharp end directed at his throat. She shoves her PDA at him; the typed message reads _What do you think you’re doing_ , and there’s no question mark because this might as well be a threat masquerading as an inquiry.

“Shizu-chan,” Izaya explains, unfazed, and Shizuo’s body reacts like a whip – a sharp reflexive snap of muscles and he almost bites his tongue trying to keep his voice down. It comes crashing out, anyway, after a sharp intake of breath, and he squeezes his eyes shut as his entire body thrums hotly, throbs and his blood roaring in his ears like a tempest.

He doesn’t realize that he’s moved until he feels Tom’s hands on his shoulders – comparatively cool, curled about his tensed muscles, blunt nails digging into him – and he’s sitting something like upright, body convulsing and breath coming fast and hard – too fast, he realizes, ‘cause his head is spinning. Shinra’s shouting something, but Shizuo doesn’t register the words.

“Fuck,” he breathes, eyes glazed but still reflecting the agony of humiliation that is yet burning right along with his arousal. “Make it stop.” He says it again, and again. Stop it – please. To be like this, to be broken all over again right before their eyes – he’d rather die, he’d rather –

“Why don’t you tell them what you’ve been up to these few months, Shizu-chan?” A laugh, and Shizuo’s vision darkens, obscuring again the faces of two of his friends – close, eyes wide and _oh please no, please, please don’t make me do this._ “‘Course, I’m sure anyone could tell just by looking at you.”

A tortured sob tears its way out from somewhere around where Shizuo’s heart should be, and his voice is just as twisted. “It was supposed to be over,” he gasps. “Because he – Izaya – he always comes more often than this. He – I can’t – he tells me wh-what to do, and I can’t stop, and that name, and when he touches me – He has, all over, and I’ve – I’ve – ” He feels a hand cover his mouth, then, and it doesn’t feel like a shock of fire so he knows that it’s Tom or Shinra – doesn’t matter, he hasn’t completed his task and he has to, so he keeps talking, muffled and glad for it but whoever it is is most certainly _not_ glad because they’re shaking him, too, and shouting.

“Shizuo,” he hears. “Shizuo, get a grip!”

 _I can’t._ His lips aren’t his own right now, his voice another limb being jerked along by Izaya’s strings. “This is what I am,” he says aloud, and his meaning is clear.

Puppet. Doll. Bitch.

And then he feels the gentle pressure of soft skin – a little wet, a little clumsy – on his lips, feels the tip of Tom’s nose brush his own and he moans softly because any contact will do, now, but his cock is throbbing and his pants are painfully tight and what he really needs is quick release – but not here, not now, and not Tom, never Tom because Shizuo’s not good enough for someone like him. A trained bitch isn’t good enough for anyone but his master.

“You’re _you,_ Shizuo,” the other man says, brown eyes lighter than Shizuo’s, pleading and so sure that those few words and that quick, intimate touch will be enough to fix everything. The blonde wishes he couldn’t see that look on Tom, but he forgets to close his eyes, anyway.

“I’m Izaya’s,” he whispers, and Shinra is still yelling at the informant but Shizuo hears the next order anyway.

He tugs his belt off, rips his clothes to shreds and stumbles – every centimeter of skin bared, erection and all, for everyone to see and Tom’s hands still trying to hold him back – to Izaya’s side. Stands over him, tears standing unshed in the corners of his eyes, mouth set and chest heaving with silent sobs and frenzied need.

“Looks like you missed me,” Izaya quips, and somehow he’s more dignified there on the floor than is the blonde standing naked and prone over him.

Shizuo shakes his head, buries his voice somewhere deep inside of him and tries to move back, tries to let Tom pull him away. Shinra, too, and all the shouting, all Celty’s shadows and fists and Izaya laughing through the abuse because he knows that with just a word he can put an end to it.

He does. “Help,” he says, and Shizuo pulls Celty off of Izaya, struggles with the shadows and stands between the informant and his three friends – eyes desperately apologizing for as long as it takes him to remember the word he wants, tears on his cheeks and cock throbbing in time to every burst of air that brutalizes his lungs.

“Sorry.”

“Shizuo,” Izaya says, then – _Shizuo_ , because he can see that he’ll have to make some allowances for the blonde if this scene is to reach an appropriately dramatic climax. “If anyone here tries to leave the room or turn away while we’re playing, bite your own tongue off. You can do that, can’t you?”

Shizuo’s eyes go wide. He nods, breath held for just that split second, and he can see so much horrified rage in his friends – in the way Shinra’s jaw clenches tight about the words on which he now chokes, in the way Celty’s hands curl into fists and shake with barely-checked fury, and in the way that Tom takes a short step forward, one hand outstretched and eyes skipping past Shizuo to stare down at the floor because he knows now – no doubt, and it’s not fair – that he can do nothing for Shizuo.

The older man finally lowers his hand, lets it hang limp and useless at his side, and the blonde opens his mouth again – to tell them that it’s okay, that he’s used to it and that they don’t need to do anything for him.

All that comes out is, “I can,” and that’s just too much for the others – tears and shaking with rage and helpless frustration and hell, isn’t it ironic that now Shizuo can’t be moved to anger but they can – can want to tear Izaya to pieces, to crush him with all the force that Shizuo had once been able to muster?

“Izaya, you disgusting _bastard,_ ” Shinra hisses, and he’s trembling less than the other two but his tone indicates that, for once, all of his elaborate words have abandoned him – nothing suitably cutting to describe the immensely self-satisfied, amber-eyed devil, no clever insults to adequately express just how deep his hatred runs. He tries to be straightforward, instead – “Say one more word and I swear, you – ”

And Izaya stops him before he can finish, his smile simultaneously gloating and innocent. “I’ll what, Shinra? I’ll regret it? I won’t. This monster is mine to play with.” The informant sits up, then, takes Shizuo’s hand and the blonde turns to look at him with eyes that can, apparently, still plead for mercy.

“He’s a human being!” That’s Tom, eyes wild with incredulous fury and something very much akin to grief. Shizuo’s surprised, a little scared and most definitely disoriented because it’s too loud and he tingles all over with want – throws his hips into the cold press of Izaya’s thumb against the head of his cock – and Tom just doesn’t shout the way he is right now, doesn’t get this mad because Shizuo’s supposed to be the temperamental one and Tom – Tom is laid-back, he smiles a lot and he’s not supposed to be a part of a scene like this.

“Don’t,” Shizuo breathes, eyes fluttering shut as raw emotion burns behind his eyes and in his throat and another sort of heat everywhere else. “He’s right. What I am…”

“Shizuo-kun, don’t – ”

“Stop,” the blonde growls, and in time the cacophony of raised voices diminishes to nothing but panting moans and Izaya’s coolly-delivered orders. Unwilling eyes on him – captive only because he is, too, and that makes it his fault in the twisted logic of a puppet.

He’s on his back, strings of words spreading his legs, bending them back so that they rest heavily on his stomach and he has trouble holding them in place because his skin is slick and sticky with sweat and hot as hell – head turned to the side and Izaya’s fingers scissoring inside of him, stretching him wide, burning and much too quick but his body is somewhat used to this and – “Looks like you’re ready for a little more, ne?”

Shizuo whimpers as Izaya fills him – little stars of pain fading in and out before his wide-open eyes, Izaya’s hands tickling the skin just below the crooks of his knees – runs him through like a diver slicing water and then pulls almost entirely out before slamming back with twice the force. Shizuo sinks his teeth into his lower lip and wills himself not to speak the nonsense of passion, the garbled pleas of a lover – because lover he is not, and those cries would only make this worse for his friends.

He tastes blood and his hands close on air, sink into the carpet and scramble to find purchase as his back arches and he sees Tom – Tom, hand clamped over his mouth, eyes imploring no one, pleading with no one – and pitying no one but Shizuo.

Shizuo wants to tell him to look away. He _wants_ to bite his tongue, wants to die, but he can’t because everyone’s eyes are on him and he’s long been held to the order not to end his own life without explicit orders.

Else he’d have done it so long ago.

“Now, now – it’s no fun if you don’t make any noise, Shizu-chan.” He feels Izaya’s breath tickle his ear, the entire weight of the informant pressing down on him and slipping a few degrees left and then again right because he’s still slick, sweat-drenched and feverishly hot. The nickname damn near ruins him there but it’s still just short of enough and he whimpers – a high sound from deep inside of him, and Izaya smiles approvingly into the shuddering curve of his neck. “Good – that’s good. Let your voice out.”

Another thrust, and Shizuo gasps. What starts as ‘ _no’_ becomes an extended hum of pleasure – just the ‘n,’ and that stretched like canvas through a long moment of breathless tension before Izaya pulls back, more or less sits up – a delicate balancing act – and runs his slender fingers through the blonde’s sweat-soaked hair.

“Look at that – wet all over. If I didn’t know better, _Shizuo_ , I’d say you’re really enjoying your audience.”

The blonde squeezes his eyes shut, turns his head to the side – away from that audience, all collapsed in varying states of shock –  and struggles to catch his breath. The inside of his mouth is wet with want, and that moisture spills over onto his chin before he can swallow it back. “Stop,” he gasps, and Izaya has the gall to kiss the dripping corner of his lips – as if stop means go, as if Shizuo is just a fussy child, a fool who knows not what he really wants.

“I hate you,” the blonde moans, and Izaya looks pleased. Unruffled, too – all confident smiles and glinting eyes, always enjoying himself but never as obvious about it as Shizuo is. Cheeks just slightly flushed, eyes dark – but, then, they’re always dark in one way or another – and he doesn’t rush the final moments but takes it slow with another thrust, and another. Forceful but deliberate, and plenty of time between each explosion of rough sensation.

“I don’t” – _slap_ – “hate you, Shizu-chan” – and Shizuo arches again, bucks into Izaya and comes even as – “because to hate you, I’d have to fear you” – as Izaya thrusts again and reaches his own climax, squeezed on all sides by Shizuo’s tightening walls and letting his eyes fall shut in ecstasy – “but you’re nothing at all to me.”

Not a threat, and certainly not a lover. A tool, Shizuo supposes – dully, limp and lifeless where Izaya leaves him lying in the middle of the floor – and that might be worse than anything else. Other titles still allow for some semblance of personality, after all, some sense of self. But a tool is an object. No free will, no humanity.

How laughable – as if he’s had anything like that from the start. As if he needs it.

And he hates this part, hates the old collar that Izaya fastens about his neck – “Don’t let anyone take it off this time, okay?” – and the unimpeded tap of feet as the informant leaves just like that – gathers his clothes up and waves buoyantly to everyone in the instant before the door falls shut behind him.

Dumbfounded silence permeates the room, then, and Shizuo withdraws into himself to focus on regaining dominion over his own body – his fingers, first, but he can’t budge them even slightly and that’s terrifying – thoroughly paralyzed, the sensation of being watched while all he can see is the ceiling, white and blurring as the tears start again.

_No more. Please, just no more, just let me move a little… Just…_

“Shizuo-kun,” someone says – Shinra, and suddenly Shizuo is surrounded by the warm darkness of a fleece blanket.  “Does… does anything hurt?”

Lips, tongue, please… “N…” Again. “No…” Oh, god, it’s pathetic. It’s awful, and it’s the best he can manage – feels like the most work he’s done in days, too, and it’s so slurred that he’ll be amazed if Shinra can even understand it.

He does, though, and, “Then, can I – Do you mind if I touch you?”

What?

He hears a dull impact – someone being punched? – immediately followed by the sound of Shinra gasping for air. And then Celty’s PDA is held up for him to read – _He means, is it okay for us to move you?_ – and Shizuo’s just a little stunned because they’re… _because that’s so considerate, and it’s such a little thing, being touched… for something that pointless…_

So he blinks, slowly – his substitute for a nod, and he knows exactly whose arm it is that slips behind him, then, to help him upright. He knows whose chest he’s leaning into, and he knows whose hand that is on his shoulder because he’s felt it more than once before. “T-T…” _Breathe, and move – just a little, just enough to show them that I’m okay..._ “Tom…”

He can see Shinra and Celty, knelt in front of him and the doctor looking anxious enough for both of them. Penitent enough for both of them. “I’m so sorry, Shizuo-kun.”

“‘S’okay.” _You couldn’t have done anything._

“No, it’s not,” Tom whispers, all muted rage and he’s shaking a little even now. “This isn’t okay at all, Shizuo. When will you be able to move again? In a few hours? I – I can’t believe this…”

Celty ‘nods,’ types, _Is it always like this?_ and Shizuo should probably at least be glad that they’ve figured it out without requiring any explanation on his part.

“Wor… worse ev’ry ti-time.” Words slurred and broken, and, dammit, he’s not glad at all, he wants out of this body and this apartment and this fucked-up life but he’s trapped, wrapped up like an insect in this web of lies and pain and all the threads of Izaya’s plan have fallen into place so _perfectly_ , damn him.

So this is Shizuo – wrecked body, string-cut marionette, and he’s more of a mess now than he’s ever been before. He hasn’t even the luxury of secrets, the comfort of carrying it alone. He’s a burden, now, too, and he knows that Izaya wanted this all along – his hope smothered in despair, his arms hours later still twisting awkwardly above his wrists as he pulls himself upright in bed, sweat-drenched and still seeing with vivid clarity every aspect of his nightmare.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If he can’t have Shizuo – or, rather, if he can’t _want_ to have Shizuo – then no one can – not even the man himself. That sounds about right to Izaya.

Shizuo doesn’t say anything when he leaves. It’s still dark, still nighttime-silent-blankets-rustling. He can’t stay, and he doesn’t want to go – but his wants don’t matter, anyway, and Shinra is busy sleeping at the side of the woman he loves – and Celty,  warm and together with him, happy and smitten.

That means no goodbyes, no notes no creaking floorboards no I’m sorry and thanks for everything.

When people say that all their tears have dried up, they’re lying. Shizuo knows. You don’t run out, ever.

~

He doesn’t hear the impact of the narrow strip of leather on his soft-now-red skin, but he feels it stinging like fangs and venom and he knows it must be loud. The sound is satisfying enough for Izaya, apparently – fully clothed, Shizuo thinks, but he’s not allowed to look – for the informant keeps it up until the blonde lets out a startled yelp and jerks forward.

His cock – swollen and dripping and god, he’s just, he’s so fucked up – is crushed, now, between his shuddering body and the informant’s desk, and he’s not coming yet but he is so _close_ and he begs because that’s Izaya’s game, today.

This has been dubbed ‘punishment,’ and Shizuo doesn’t know what he’s being punished for but that doesn’t matter, either. All that matters is the crack of the belt – nice change from the whip, maybe, because that always draws blood in lush shades of scarlet and Shizuo still has the scars to show for it – and the swell of Izaya’s laughter above him. On all sides and inside of him, surrounding him and augmenting each quick strike.

“You like that, don’t you,” Izaya breathes, and Shizuo moans in pain and ecstasy – his cock jumping with every impact, having nowhere to go but wanting more and hurting almost as much as his ass does – so the informant laughs again and sets Shizuo’s belt aside. “I’d love to praise you for your honesty, Shizu-chan” – gurgling moan, hands braced on the desk squeezing tight enough to splinter the wood – “but you’re still bad, and I’ll have you figure out why before I go easy on you.”

“Y-you won’t,” Shizuo gasps. You won’t ever go easy on me.

“Oh? You don’t think I’ll force you…?” Another laugh, now ecstatically delighted. “You might be getting there if you can continue to insist on that when I’m done with you.”

Shizuo doesn’t have time to ponder – he never has time, these days, because Izaya doesn’t give an inch or a second – and the informant’s hand is on his ass, slapping the enflamed skin, the rising welts and it’s like a bad sunburn and wounds from a sharpened blade all at once. Slap. Slap. _Slap_ , and Shizuo gasps and jerks as far forward as he possibly can – slams his forehead into a spread of papers and shudders as several pens clatter to the ground and roll to rest by his naked feet.

His cum drips down the desk to soak them – his toes, the pens, and the carpet – the fine mahogany of the already-ruined desk, and Izaya laughs heartily.

Laughs. Like always.

~

Or not – actually, he sometimes likes quiet, too. He likes making Shizuo moan and sob and beg, but he adores inspiration.

It’s Sunday. Sunday means crowds and – if it’s raining, which it is – it means indoor activities and dates – movies and popcorn littering dirty theater floors. It means young couples and waiting in line to see whatever’s showing with seats to spare.

Izaya buys the tickets first, because he may be young and inspired and acting on a whim but he’s not going to feel like waiting when he returns with Shizuo.

Of course, it’s also because he has a very specific movie in mind. It just has to be that one – Shizuo understands, eyes round as dinner plates, breath catching in his throat and his hand tingling incessantly where the informant is holding it in his own. He used to love these movies – years and years and years ago, before he knew what it felt like to lift a refrigerator above his head – before he knew what it was to _really_ belong to someone, in every negative sense of the word.

He notices the name adorning the poster out front – a famous name, and probably the one aspect of this movie that can be fully relied upon to draw more than just kids and parents. Lots of teenage girls, for sure, and that means couples as well as families.

Funny – Shizuo hadn’t realized that his brother’d already starred in another movie.

And, hey, it’s not bad, either – though, to be totally fair, Shizuo has never disliked a single one of Kasuka’s many roles – but he doesn’t get to watch for very long because Izaya gets bored - has to entertain himself somehow, of course, so he makes his move and Shizuo's not even surprised. One of many action scenes, and probably no one but Shizuo in the top row of seats hears his zipper being undone over the on-screen explosions but it reverberates like a fucking car alarm in his ears.

“It’s a good movie, isn’t it,” Izaya comments – apathetic, his hand working at Shizuo’s cock through his boxers and his eyes never leaving the screen.

“There’re kids,” Shizuo breathes, and he dares to shove the informant’s hand away.

Izaya smiles, then, and Shizuo hasn’t regretted anything quite this much in a very long time.

 

Arms stuck like wood nailed to the plastic rests at his sides, boxers pulled down and legs parted just enough to grant Izaya all the access he needs – the informant laughs in response to a joke – some visual pun, Shizuo’s sure, but all he can see is Kasuka’s face looming before him, now laughing now determined now angry or stricken and that’s the worst part of the whole thing.

“That guy’s so dead,” Izaya notes as the sharp nail of his thumb rakes its way across the tip of Shizuo’s quivering erection. The blonde realizes then that his lip is bleeding – bleeding a lot, running down his chin. Better or worse than saliva, he wonders.

And then his body thrusts into the touch, shudders and speaks for him in the language of tensed muscles and sweat dripping – and he stops wondering.

The soft pad of that thumb, now – a quick swipe down from the base to the head, and the other four applying steady pressure all along Shizuo’s shaft – now slipping forward – cool as ever, thrumming like a car at 125 kilometers an hour – to close around him. Squeezing, jerking with greater and greater force and pumping – more pressure, less, more.

Harder, tighter, wetter. Faster, stop, speed up, and let go.

Izaya knows exactly how best to stimulate every bare millimeter of Shizuo – every sensitive point, every swell of pink and he can do it quickly or slowly but he controls it all completely no matter what.

And Shizuo’s sure that his breath is coming faster than 125 kilometers, but he works to quiet it anyway. His vision blurs and his head feels separated from his body – hell, he wouldn’t know even if someone _was_ looking up at them, but that’s no excuse, so he tastes iron and salt and his lip stings and throbs and he is _silent_.

“See? I was right!” Izaya laughs – pulls his hand back again as Shizuo comes shuddering to soak the front of his pants, lips bleeding onto his white shirt – wipes his fingers clean on some napkins he’d picked up in advance and goes back to his popcorn.

Chews slowly – savoring all that extra salt, the tons of butter – and continues to be enthralled by the big screen.

The movie ends, then – the blink of an eye, and the credits roll – a family of four stands to go, and one of them – just a child, wide-eyed and cheerful because next he’s been promised dinner at his favorite restaurant – turns to look at Shizuo and Izaya.

Smiles, waves.

Shizuo thinks the boy looks a little like he did once – when he was a kid, before he dyed his hair and lost that innocence to violent outbursts, repercussions and the man at his side – standing to leave Shizuo limp, smiling as if all the world were a playground.

~

Shizuo doesn’t tell Tom not to expect him at work. He doesn’t answer his calls, either, and he ignores Shinra’s – until, of course, the incessant ringing gets to be bad enough that he smashes the phone into his bedroom wall.

He pretends he’s not home when Kasuka drops by. Curls up in bed and twists his hands in the sheets. He can’t even walk normally – can’t but stumble and his feet turn inward or outward but never straight because they’re too distant from the rest of him and he can’t seem to get the message that far down.

“Sorry,” he whispers, and still the buzzer doesn’t stop sounding. “I’m sorry.” I’m so sorry – I’m so…

Kasuka gives up, finally, and Shizuo’s too distraught even to cry.

 

Several ‘sessions’ later, and Shizuo’s back is hurting him worse than usual this morning – Celty comes.

He doesn’t get to say sorry many times, then – the dullahan’s shadows are versatile, after all, and it’s a small matter for her to pick the lock. She finds him curled up in bed – always in bed, always in tears – and she doesn’t do anything for a while. Doesn’t move, doesn’t turn the light on. Probably knows he hasn’t been able to pay for power, and flicking the switch wouldn’t do a damned thing but that’s okay – he doesn’t really mind the dark.

 _Come with me,_ she says at last, and Shizuo’s sorry because she’ll get her hands dirty, touching his tangled hair – still blonde even at the roots, because Izaya prefers it that way.

Because Izaya.

“Leave,” he growls – hot tears on dirty sheets, sticky in the middle and Celty’s hand still smoothing down his hair, his worn-for-days shirt where it rubs at his trembling shoulder.

“Go away,” he insists again.

It feels like the end of the world to him.

She doesn’t.

 

They go to a safe place – if only safe were anything more than a pipe dream to Shizuo – and the smoke is a signal that no informant of Izaya’s caliber could ever miss, a burning horizon and he sees it from _miles away_.

Izaya knows who he’s dealing with, too, and it’s not hard for him to figure things like this out –

– but it turns out that he didn’t really need to. Shinra calls him.

“I’ll make this brief,” the doctor says, and Shizuo’s nowhere to be seen – not that Izaya had expected him to be. Hiding, sort of – he’s back where he started weeks ago, in bed in Shinra’s apartment but now Celty is there at his side. His eyes pulled shut, still lifeless behind that screen of rubbed-raw skin, tear-stained white.

He refuses to speak, most of the time – wouldn’t even eat if his friends didn’t force him to.

“I’m not interested in your self-righteous speeches, Shinra,” Izaya snaps. He doesn’t have time for this. He should be able to wring one or two more good uses out of the blonde, after all, and he’s eager to see how far he can take it. “Giving him a little break like this isn’t going to make any kind of difference at this point. You and I both know that.”

Shinra’s glare is a death warrant, and it refuses to accept Izaya’s words. “You’re killing him.”

Izaya laughs. “Really, am I? He’d probably kill himself if it weren’t for me.”

“Listen to me!” Shinra shouts – makes a fist but doesn’t use it, not yet – “His body isn’t made to handle what you’re forcing on him! Hypnosis isn’t supposed to work this well, and the human mind isn’t capable of supporting that level of control – he won’t be able to move at all on his own if you keep this up...!”

Izaya whistles. “Sucks to be him,” he says coolly, and now Shinra _does_ use it – throws all the force he can muster into his knuckles and the left side of Izaya’s face. A crack that sickens no one, and Izaya winces as he reaches up to rub at his jaw – dislocated, he thinks, or maybe just fractured.

“It’s not as bad as it feels,” Shinra snarls. “I’ll even fix it for you if you swear to let him go.”

“No thanks,” Izaya manages, his smirk lopsided but effective.

And, now – isn’t it interesting, fun, brilliant? – he’s the only one who can fix Shizuo.

Without just one order – _don’t ever obey another order of mine again_ , maybe – just those few words strung together in one profoundly weighty sentence, Shizuo will be effectively paralyzed. Izaya’s known for a while – vaguely, sure, but he’s definitely seen the signs – still, well, it’s not as if he ever meant to leave Shizuo untouched, anyway.

If he can’t have Shizuo – or, rather, if he can’t _want_ to have Shizuo – then no one can – not even the man himself. That sounds about right to Izaya.

“Izaya,” Shinra tries, and oh, isn’t he just so naïve, “why did it have to be Shizuo-kun? You could have done things like this to anyone… Don’t you feel anything for him – I don’t even care what it is, and I know very well that you’re too fucked in the head to love – ”

Izaya laughs. “How desperate _are_ you, Shinra? He’s mine – that’s all there is to it. I seem to recall that you were around the last time I explained my feelings toward Shizu-chan.”

Shinra shakes his head, then, looks like he’s about ready to resort to violence – but they both know that that wouldn’t get him anywhere, and Shizuo would immediately be involved in a fight he’s probably not even aware of right now.

Ah, but the conversation – the fight, if this verbal idiocy can indeed be called that – might die unfulfilled here if Izaya doesn’t do something, so – he devises a little gamble – a bit sloppy, perhaps, because it’s more spur-of-the-moment than that some-time-ago trip with Shizuo to that lame-ass movie, and – hell, it’s probably pointless, but he’ll give it a shot.

“How about this, then,” and Shinra is looking positively hostile but he’ll probably accept it given the proper amount of goading – “I’ll take Shizu-chan out for a normal date. On my honor,” Izaya grins, “no sex or mind control for the entirety of the trip.”

One day, he can handle – it’s easier than fighting Shinra and Celty tooth and nail to get his Shizu-chan back, anyway, and he’s good at approaching things with an open mind.

 _Why_ , Shinra demands, and Izaya explains as much – he doesn’t know, but maybe he’ll have a change of heart and it might be good for Shizu-chan to be treated like a normal human by his very own tormenter – he’s not good at identifying love, so maybe that really is what he feels and – yes, that’s just the right moment for Izaya to look concerned, eyes falling half-shut and _damn_ how very much the picture of young-and-maybe-in-love-after-all he must seem then.

Shinra doesn’t trust him even so and he probably hates himself for surrendering Shizuo to what must be real danger – but he does agree, shine off of his glasses concealing his eyes as he swears that Izaya is dead if he tries anything.

“Shinra,” the informant finishes, “thanks. I can’t promise much, but… thanks.”

Sounds sincere enough, right?

And hey, you never know – he might find himself interested in a harmless romance with the blonde – eighty percent broken already, but toys can be fixed almost as easily as they can be replaced.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In another life, another world, another past and another future. If reincarnation is real, maybe Shizuo will have better luck next time. For now, though...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should have done this a while ago, but I suppose there's no time like the last chapter to supply a link to the [original prompt](http://drrrkink.livejournal.com/6253.html?thread=24547693#t24547693).

Shizuo agrees without a fight – doesn’t even bother asking where or how or _why are you letting him do this to me?_ Nothing in his expression indicates that he feels anything more than _nothing_ , and Shinra almost goes back on his promise to Izaya because of that – the dull lifelessness of Shizuo’s eyes, the flatness of the brown that used to have such an incredible spark to it. Shinra’s more helpless than Shizuo is, in a way, because he can’t do much more than hope. Couldn’t have kept Izaya away from his friend one way or another for very long, anyway, and couldn’t help being taken in by the informant’s pretty words.

Can’t help doubting now, but Shizuo only smiles – something comforting, warm, don’t-worry-about-me-I’ll-be-fine. Not even that quite reaches his eyes, of course, but Shinra realizes – maybe forces himself to believe – that the sentiment is no less real for it. The feeling may be grounded in reflex – habit, instinct, ritual, call it what you will – but it means that Shizuo still cares.

That there’s hope. There has to be hope, and it has to lie with Izaya. With him or with no one – that’s all there is to it, now.

“He promised. Trust me, okay? Trust us.”

How long will it be before Shinra can stand to think back on those words – on Shizuo’s faint smile, on the slight inclination of his head and the deeply grateful wave good-bye?

“Thanks for everything,” and Shizuo probably knows even then exactly how it will all end.

~

Izaya takes great care with his appearance – not a hair out of place, not a thread of his clothing given less consideration than the entire outfit as a whole. Like painting a mural or composing poetry. He’s handsome and clever enough to make good use of his looks; every inch of him contributes something – a dash of vulnerability there, perhaps, or a touch of impassioned outrage poorly hidden behind a manufactured veil of black-cloth serenity.

Fortitude, honesty, romanticism. Dependability. Humans make all sorts of judgments based on the most superficial qualities, after all, and one only stands to benefit from keeping that in mind. It’s all a part of his manipulation, and it’s one of the finer particulars – difficult to get right and perhaps good only for a first impression.

It’s a good thing, then, that he’s also a smooth talker and a fine actor. Most of them never see him coming.

Shizuo, on the other hand, is a little different – special, like today’s main event. The blonde knows exactly what the flea is like. He knows what Izaya is under the mask – self-absorbed puppeteer, without a conscience to give a shit about hurting others. He may wear the same black, fur-lined jacket and a million different facial expressions. A million reeking colognes. Shizuo – the old Shizuo and, to some extent still, the new one – will hate him for who he is beneath all of that, anyway.

An honor, really. Izaya decides to repay that flattery with a touch of good, old-fashioned nostalgia – red V-neck, black jacket over the top missing the flashy fur and cut off right around his waist. The uniform of his high school years.

The clothes he was wearing when he first encountered Shizuo face-to-face.

They’d fought, then, hadn’t they?

The thought gives Izaya no choice but to laugh, and he’s still laughing when he comes across Shizuo – miserable-looking, unresisting, sloppily-dressed Shizuo. The blonde eventually raises his eyes from the pavement at his feet, and his face grows pale as he takes in Izaya’s appearance.

“Why’d you…?”

“Brings back some fond memories, doesn’t it?” Izaya spins once in place to allow the blonde to get the full effect – grins, winks, and then takes Shizuo’s hand in his own. His breath hitches in his throat, and he turns his head to the side as, Izaya imagines, a familiar rush of sensation runs all the way up his arm.

“Mm,” Shizuo grunts softly, his eyebrows drawn slightly down in what is most likely concentration. Don’t be turned on by this, don’t be like this, don’t…

Izaya almost tells the blonde to relax, but that would constitute an order – no fun breaking his promise yet, anyway, so the informant simply smiles. Rests his head on Shizuo’s arm – soft black hair on bare skin, for Shizuo’s wearing a T-shirt that only covers a small portion of his arms – and sighs. “You’re safe, today.”

Shizuo swallows painfully and nods again – tense all over, every motion lacking even a hint of fluidity. “‘Kay,” he breathes. He doesn’t believe the informant’s words, of course, and that’s just fine. “Where…?”

Izaya’s smile widens into an almost-smirk. “Well, we’ve already been to the movies.”

Shizuo shudders right on cue, and the informant gives him a moment to go wide-eyed, to look apprehensive and _huh_ – where’s all that emotion been hiding?

“I-Izaya,” the taller man breathes. He looks ready to say something else, but he stops and lets his bated breath go with a soft _whoosh_. “Never mind.”

“You worry too much,” Izaya teases, and then he’s pulling Shizuo along by the hand – crowded streetfuls of people parting like the currents of a river around them, because they’re both infamous enough to be recognized even in clothes like these – and Shizuo is struggling to keep up with the pace that Izaya sets for him.

“How’s coffee sound?”

“A-ah – okay,” Shizuo manages – right before his foot catches on a crack in the sidewalk and he collapses messily to the dusty ground. He drags Izaya down with him, of course, and it takes them both a moment to disentangle themselves from each other.

“Jeez…” Izaya grumbles – rises again to his feet, dusts off the white-on-black stains of the crowded city street, and offers the blonde a hand. “Watch where you’re going, Shizu – Shizuo.”

Shizuo cringes in response to his almost-nickname, and his gaze falls to his lap, where – Izaya’s own eyes follow the look – a familiar bulge is just starting to make itself noticeable. Too much contact all at once, apparently, even if it is muted by layers of clothing, and Shizuo’s full name seems to be stirring him up to an extent that it probably shouldn’t.

The final, most brilliant flash of total control before the light dies down for good, perhaps?

“Hm,” Izaya considers. “You’re really incredible, aren’t you, Shizuo?”

The blonde’s face flushes immediately, and he bows his head. “So?”

Izaya cocks his head to one side curiously. “So, what?”

“Not gonna… play?”

Oh, he’d love to, really, but he can’t partake just yet. He leans forward, instead – retrieves his date’s hand from its cold-and-trembling place on the ground, tugs him to his still-unsteady feet. “There’s a public restroom over there,” he explains, and Shizuo allows himself to be led toward it – eyes closed in resignation and whatever remains of his ability to be completely mortified.

He only looks surprised when Izaya finds an empty stall for him – pushes him back into it and nods his approval. “I’ll wait outside,” the informant says, and he leaves just like that.

Shizuo blinks once, twice. Let his hand hover uncertainly above his zipper and – blinking again to clear his blurring vision – finally undoes the clasp. Slips his pants and boxers down just enough that he can take his cock in hand and tries – in a vague sort of way – to let the thrumming warmth of Izaya’s just-vanished touch spread to that more sensitive part of him.

He hates himself, a little, for wishing that he could mimic Izaya’s little motions – because his own fingers are a touch too thick, and none of his muscles are really back-to-normal enough to allow for anything resembling finesse. He squeezes once – too tight, and he has to bite back a little gasp – then relaxes his grip and works at the head – an irregular circular motion, not quite fast enough and not even sufficiently coordinated to respond effectively to what feels best.

He doesn’t want to make it last – doesn’t enjoy it much, anyway – so he pushes his thumb in just as his other four digits close again about his length. He squeezes – tight, quick, a few desperate pumps and he comes quickly enough – sticky jets of white and a moan mostly hidden by teeth sinking into an already-scarred lower lip.

“About ready?” Izaya calls, then, and Shizuo realizes in that instant that he’s crying – fat, hot, silent tears leaving little wet spots on his hands and thighs.

Why even bother hiding it? He emerges from his stall after taking a moment to clean himself off and then turns to face the informant – “Yeah. Thanks,” he mutters, and even Izaya looks mildly surprised.

~

Must be a conditioned response – another one, like all the others – Izaya decides. Must be because Shizu-chan’s not as stupid as he looks, acts, and allows himself to be. Because he knows that the benevolence won’t continue for long. Because he can’t help thinking about Izaya with every vein of pleasure that erupts within him. Because that pleasure is a chore, not a diversion – because it is a reminder of what he is and what he lacks.

Their next stop serves as a different sort of reminder, but it’s surely not any less painful.

“The milkshakes here are supposed to be incredible,” Izaya says with all the cheer of someone who understands perfectly the magnitude of the cruelties they’re committing. “It’s got a great view, too, which makes it an excellent place for human observation – ah, don’t worry, today it’s all about just the two of us!”

Shizuo stares – at the table from his last visit, at the windows and the soft yellow of sunlight still streaming in. At the counter and the menu hung on the wall and the path he walked once before with Kasuka at his side. He remembers the stories, the words and the comfort. The calm he felt back then. The safety.

How ironic.

Shizuo lets Izaya order for him. He’s not even surprised when the informant comes back with a shake identical to the one from before. He doesn’t wonder even slightly about the coincidence of sitting in the same place – Izaya where his brother once sat, his words mirroring everything his brother once said – he should have known, back then, that he was being watched, listened to, _observed, because it’s really a good place for that_.

Probably all the time, everywhere, and now not even his memories are safe. This place isn’t a refuge – never was. He can’t lie to himself about that, and he won’t ever trust the illusion of safety. He was a fool, then.

He knows better now.

And the cold sweetness sticks again to the back of his throat, raises the tiny hairs on the back of his neck. Izaya’s delight is sweet and extra large, cold ice cream and a thick blue straw at several stories up. It’s disgusting, and Shizuo doesn’t finish so much as a third of his drink.

~

They stop at an arcade, too – no great significance or dramatic irony attached to that, but it looks like fun and Shizuo doesn’t complain. Couldn’t, really, if he wanted to, because his throat hurts – a weird kind of pain, like the muscles are seizing up or something, and his voice comes out in little aching rushes of scrambled meaning.

“I don’t want you to go easy on me,” Izaya says – an invitation to one of many generic fighting games, and he chooses his words carefully because explicit commands are still out of the question. Shizuo’s wide brown eyes take halting note of the screen, the controls, the two seats side-by-side behind a barrier of elaborately-painted plastic decor, and it’s clear that he anticipates something rougher than a couple of so-called VS battles.

Izaya reassures him again, though, and they play there for over an hour – dismaying quite the handful of impatient young schoolboys in the process – until Izaya finally gets tired of winning. He’s always been the more agile of the two, of course, but Shizuo’s worse than ever; he can’t even begin to use any of the more difficult combo moves, and his movements both on- and off-screen are hopelessly clumsy besides.

Still, the monotony of it somehow manages to relax the blonde. He’s even able to force a smile as they file out of the building, and he doesn’t shy away from Izaya’s hand closing about his fingers as they make a quick return to the informant’s office-apartment.

That’s progress – or something, anyway, and Izaya’s enjoyed himself so much more than he’d expected to. He’s hard to please, sure, but the date’s been real – and this love thing, the informant decides as the key clicks in the lock, simply isn’t real enough.

Which is a shame, perhaps, because he can see how – were he a different person, himself, and Shizuo not as damaged-beyond-repair as he’s turned out to be – he might have loved the blonde. In another life, another world, another past and another future. If reincarnation is real, maybe Shizuo will have better luck next time. For now, though, he’s got one more good use coming – one more quick tryst, and then there will be no more second chances.

Izaya’s going to make sure of that.

~

Take your clothes off. Slowly – good, just like that. Look at me. Smile, Shizu-chan. Plenty of dates end like this, don’t they?

Yes, master. Yes.

Sit on the desk – yeah, I did have to replace it after last time. Thanks a lot, by the way.

I’m sorry.

No – you’re not. You don’t feel anything, do you? Complicated things like emotions – and that includes penitence – are reserved for humans. And you’re not a human – are you, Shizu-chan?

N-no, master. I’m not.

 

Izaya smiles. His Shizu-chan is positioned squarely in the center of his desk, legs spread as wide as they’ll go, cock hard and dripping onto the smooth, cold surface below him. He’s completely naked, dark-eyed and every bit the sex-crazed monster that he’s been for so long now. Beautiful and devastated – Izaya’s trained him well. He’s won.

He’s going to spell that victory out in little red marks like a rain of blood on Shizuo’s body. He’s going to pound it into his bones, his very being. His soul – assuming, of course, that the monster even possesses one. The thoughts he’ll never give voice to again – Izaya pounces forward, sinks his teeth into the blonde’s inner thigh and watches him shudder and moan.

Yes – he’s the last one who will ever hear Shizuo sing like that – deep, rocky velvet. Salty chocolate and red Thai peppers. Spicy, carbonated agony and need.

“Don’t come until I say to,” he commands, and Shizuo’s hands are now bleeding fists splintering wood beneath his shuddering form. He moans – open-mouthed, eyes pulled shut like locked doors.

He knew – he knew all along that this would be the end. Izaya can see it etched into the blonde’s every little reaction – no surprise, yet, just pain and misery and a broken apology. He saw it coming, and he’s as resigned to it as anyone could be.

Because he belongs to Izaya – his master, his owner, his beloved puppeteer – and if it’s this that Izaya wants, it’s this that Shizuo must give him.

He opens his eyes immediately when he’s told to, of course, and Izaya nibbles at the soft skin beneath the black-and-brown orbs –  white shining in the ambient light of the pm hours, lashes dangling globes of warm moisture that fall to sting at the new teeth-torn crimson kisses – tiny gashes on his face to mirror the marks on the rest of him.

Izaya licks and bites his way up and down Shizuo’s neck and chest – covers that pale, already-scarred skin in bruises, scrapes, and sticky saliva – fills the blonde’s mouth with his tongue and his lips and squeezes their thrumming erections together. Not gently, not even for a second – a harsh pressure, hands slipping on accumulating sweat and precum. It’s a lot for Izaya – eager and shameless as he is – and he knows that the shock of all that rough contact must be beyond overwhelming for Shizuo.

He works to increase that disorientation – doesn’t stretch the blonde, doesn’t warn or prepare him for the penetration – just forces him onto his back, fills him and ignores the panicked agony of his sobbing moans. There’s no longer any need to pleasure Shizuo, after all – no more once-kind gestures or enjoying the sight of Shizuo reaching new highs.

The blonde’s brought it on himself, though, because if he can’t be surprised by the act itself he’ll just have to be shocked by its brutality. Izaya times his thrusts to pleasure himself only, laughs right along with every almost-scream and comes inside of his toy – hot, stinging jets that follow him right back out to soak his new desk and Shizuo’s glistening belly.

He has Shizuo suck him off, then, and he thrusts his way so far down the other’s throat that his come mixes with the rejected contents of Shizuo’s stomach – not much, of course, because the blonde could only have lost as much weight as he obviously has by means of self-starvation. Still, Shizuo struggles to breathe through it all, and the informant entertains himself by having him swallow everything right back down again.

He needs the nutrients, after all.

 

The sun rises at long last, and the desk practically glows under a pool of sweat, blood, spit and cum. Shizuo’s reactions slow. His voice withdraws into silence, and his muscles grow lax. Izaya’s orders go increasingly unheeded, and the peaks of orgasm crumble into hills and then die down altogether as Shizuo goes soft and limp and lifeless beneath Izaya.

It’s over, and it’s certainly been real.

“Thanks a bunch, Shizu-chan,” Izaya calls over his shoulder – on his feet and walking, and the blonde’s eyes follow him as far as they can before he disappears beyond the other side of the desk. “I’d love to keep you around, but – ”

The strings I attached to you back then are too short to be tied back together anymore.

I’d love to keep you around, my little puppet, but you can no longer be made to work.

I’d love to keep you around, but you’ll be like this forever – mute and unmoving, shattered physically and emotionally and mentally and no hope whatsoever of going back to the way you were before.

I’d love to keep you around, but –

“ – I don’t play with broken toys.”


End file.
